i've never seen the war
by HeartOfCoal
Summary: 'That first night, when I found him at 5:46 a.m. in the bathroom, almost-sunrise bleeding through the windows and onto his skin, I thought he was the most beautiful person I'd ever seen- and he was the most broken, too.' trigger warning. really short- might continue, i don't know.
1. Chapter 1

**a/u: hi guys. sorry, my ideas have been shit lately. let me know what you think of this one, please, and happy reading!**

There were days when he was okay.

The cases would still be fresh on his tongue, the chases still pumping through the map work of his veins, and he'd come home and stand in the middle of the flat- long fingers dangling next to his thighs and his hair tousled. He was whole, even if he was never wholehearted. That's okay- nobody ever expected him to be that, anyway. I could watch him function. His gaze would be fully his; he was never un-tormented, but in those fleeting hours, he was almost calm.

I would imagine him creasing those seemingly meaningless hours and minutes and seconds and slipping them into the pocket of his coat.

These were the good days- the best days.

Rest, for him, would come in sudden intervals. Single digit catnaps, folded up on the couch, with the sound of keys bouncing off the walls and imbedding itself in our skin. Even in sleep, he was restless. I would watch him sigh, irritable, and then wake half way- half in one world, half in the other. Part of me wanted (needed) to know which one he would prefer to inhabit.

Then came the days where the hours washed over him in layers. It was if a thick blanket of snow fell over him. Sleep would steal him for countless hours, but I heard him scream himself awake; he wouldn't (couldn't?) eat. His steps heavy, weary, forced- words stuck to his tongue.

I couldn't help him when the words wouldn't come, and I couldn't help him when they came too fast for me to do anything with them. They would spill over my hands, lifeless once escaped from the roof of his mouth, and I'd watch them shudder for a second at my feet before I looked up.

It felt like I had known him for years.

I had never seen him cry. He was stone. Meanwhile, I was starting to wonder which one of us was the war victim.

That first night, when I found him at 5:46 a.m. in the bathroom, almost-sunrise bleeding through the windows and onto his skin, I thought he was the most beautiful person I'd ever seen- and he was the most broken, too. I peeled his trench-filled forearms away from where he had it pressed against his naked chest. Blood swirled onto the skin of my hand. His pulse pounded against my thumb- weak, defiant.

I think I loved him, right then.

"I'm sorry." He was quiet.

"It's okay."

"It's not okay."

It wasn't okay.


	2. Chapter 2

**a/u: hi, so i decided to ass onto this a little. might do more. 4 day weekend, gotta do something. please tell me what you think.**

* * *

_i don't mean to be a mess._

**I'm not a mess.**

My mind is just filled to the brim with overbearing seemingly nothings, but those insignificant pieces howl at me until I say them (or do them). _it's hard._ **I'm not saying it's hard.**

Of course, there are days when it's okay. Sunrises that I'm sleeping during, mindless and not my own- and I like that. There's half of me that shies away at the lack of self awareness, but then there's that section that relishes in it. Drowns in it.

And there are days when J is okay, too, and those usually fall in step with my own. I tell myself they have no correlation. Those are the nights that I stay awake long after he goes to bed, and I tell myself that it's because I have too much to think about (and not because I'm listening to see if he wakes with the war in his sheets). Because one time I said something to him, and I saw it in his eyes (that spark of gun powder on pale green canvas) that suddenly he just wan't okay.

That was a night I heard him wake.

That was the night that I crept up the stairs and listened until I knew he was sleeping again before slipping into his bedroom. His chest rose and fell shakily. Frailly. Beside him, his fingers toyed with his sheets- air got stuck on his chapped lips. Sweat lingered on his forehead.

I came in to see if he was okay, and I knew that he wasn't, and I left.

And then I was rushed by a wave of _ohmygodi'manidiot_ and fell into my own bed, but didn't sleep. J was broken and that was the world's fault. I was broken and that was my fault.

A hole in my bed frame. I stuck my hand inside the hallow, pulled out an old cigar box, felt the metal laugh at me from inside. I almost laughed back.

Then it started again- the quiet nights with the unstitching of my skin, where the sound of my fibers being pried apart filled my head along side the nothings. J screamed above me, and I screamed below him (but inside, and never in the way I thought we were supposed to be screaming).

There was a night where I went to far. Pushed down too hard, too fast, and in the wrong (but sosososo right) place, and my head flushed and my skin grew warm. Bathroom walls- the night is a blur. I think about taking a shower. And then suddenly I remember being 16 and in the same position, and how badly that shower hurt, and so I sink farther back against the wall.

Press my head against the tub. Cold- I can't wake up.

That's how J finds me, when it's almost dawn and I can see that he hasn't slept at all and I guess that he knows I haven't, either.

He tells me it's okay and I know it's not but I don't say so.

I want to tell him I love him, but that's cliché. J tears my arms away from my torso. His touch is hot.

Minutes pass. Bandages wrapped around my arm. Disinfectant.

"You should get help."

"I don't need help." I don't mean for it to come out bitter, but it still does.

We stop talking. The sun has risen, coating J's face in fresh light, and I swear, I've never seen someone so tiered. With the night, J turns to leave, and I reach out enough to let my fingers catch the hem of his sweater.

"What?" I don't know if he means for it to come out that huskily, but it does. My hair stands up on end.

"Nothing."

The door closes; I push the air away (and the thoughts of my scars/cuts/pain).


	3. Chapter 3

**a/u: probably the final chapter. let me know what you think. happy reading!**

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The days that follow the bathroom episode hang over os both like pregnant clouds. S has become quiet around me- it's dreadfully quiet in the flat without him judging how my day went and what I had for lunch based on how I walk. No violin; not lately.

We tiptoe around each other. Me, trying not to stare blatantly at the bulge under his sweater, riding on his forearm, and him, biting his tongue (and his lip, but I don't know why).

The sense we had for each other is still there.

I know he hears me screaming awake- and I hear him, too. He must be a mess in those hours. God knows I am.

There's some aching part of me that thinks that two messes together must make something erratically beautiful. But then I think how two wrongs don't make a right. Then again, who said we were wrong?

The only reason I know he's not home when I get to the flat is because he's left a note. It's small, three words- but it's the first way we've tried to communicate with each other in days. I don't throw it away; I put it in the bottom of my dresser.

I know he doesn't like being waited up for, but it's not like I could sleep, so I sit across from the telly, but don't watch it. The clock moans in my ear. It's nearing four am and my back aches and my heart is in my mouth by the time I hear the front door open.

Quiet footsteps- trying not to wake anyone.

His hair is a mess. Night-soaked ringlets falling around his eyes. A strand stuck to his lips. The door click shuts behind him, soft and the push of air moving the bottom of his coat, and he leans against the door. I start to notice a dark mark shadowing his cheekbone.

"What happened?"

S shrugs. That's when I start to smell the sharp sent coming from him, a mix of booze and nicotine, and it almost makes me sick.

"Did you fall?"

"MmMm." His fingers run through his hair. My heart drops. "Jus' don't worry 'bout it."

"Yeah."

I don't know when I stood, but I suddenly feel very out of place, so I turn on my heel and begin towards my own room. The sound of my pulse pounds in my head. Beneath me, my mattress feels familiar and I hate it. It smells like detergent and everything else that's planned and there and god dammit I can't take it.

A deep, throaty creak comes from outside my door.

"What do you want?"

"J'n?" I hear him lean against the wall outside the door.

"What?"

"C'n I come 'n?"

"No. I'm trying to sleep, Sherlock."

For a second I think he's actually going to go back downstairs (and that's when my heart gets pulled to hell) but then my door slips open.

S's fingers toy with the hem of his shirt. He's lost the coat, and stand in my doorway clad in a pair of loose-fitting pants and a half-unbuttoned shirt. There's a few specks of blood on his collar. The bandage has come off his arm- I see the valleys in his forearms and turn away from him.

He knows that's why I turn.

"I'm s'rry," he whispers.

I pretend not to hear him.

"Jo'n?"

"I'm trying to sleep."

"I…"

"God, dammit, what?"

When I flip back around, his eyes are wide and surprised, like someone has just splashed cold water on his face.

"Nothing." He turns to leave.

"Sherlock?"

Pauses in the hallway- I can see his fingers linger on the wall, mid-trace. He looks like a statue.

I push myself out of bed. It creaks, groaning, begging for me to stay, but I can't.

"Wh't?"

"Come here."

S turns around, slowly, letting his hand drop from the wall. He looks young; with the light from my room falling over his sharp features, and the white collar of his shirt upturned and skimming his face.

His tongue darts out and slides over his bottom lip. "Are you gon'a kiss me?"

I don't know. I really really just _don't know._ So I don't answer.

"John."

"Yes?"

"I asked you a question."

"Am I?"

"Are you?"

I shrug. S bites down on his lip, leaning back and pressing his shoulders into the wall. There's a moment that I think he's going to turn and go downstairs, but then he shoots forward, almost falling, and catches himself on the other wall. He looms over me.

"Are you going to kiss me?" I ask, tease falling over a pounding heart. _God damn._

"I don't know, am I?"

"Yes."

And he does, and I don't regret my answer. He tastes like vodka and some kind of contained misery, but I feel like part of that reflects me, so I kiss him back.


End file.
